Italian concentration camps include camps from the Italian colonial wars in Africa as well as camps for the civilian population from areas occupied by Italy during World War II. Memory of both camps were subjected to "historical amnesia". The repression of memory led to historical revisionism in Italy[1] and in 2003 the Italian media published Silvio Berlusconi's statement that Benito Mussolini only "used to send people on vacation".[2][3]
Colonial wars
editThere were numerous war crimes conducted by the Italian Army in the colonies. In Cyrenaica alone between 1929 and 1933 over 40,000 people were killed and 80,000 locked up in concentration camps,[4] out of a total population of just 193,000. According to the historian Ilan Pappé, the fascist regime between 1928 and 1932 killed half the Bedouin population either directly or by starvation in the fields.[5] According to the historian Angelo Del Boca, in 1933, of the approximately 100,000 Libyans deported from Jebel Achdar and Marmarica, more than 40,000 died in the camps.[6]
Name of the camp | Location of camp | Present-day country | Date of establishment | Date of disestablishment | Estimated number of prisoners | Estimated number of deaths |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nocra | Nocra | Eritrea | 1930s | 1941 | 1,500[7] | |
Abyar | Abyar | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 3,123[8] | |
Agedabia | Ajdabiya | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 10,000[8] | 1,500[9] |
El Agheila | El Agheila | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 10,900[8] | |
Marsa Brega | Brega | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 21,117[8] | |
Sid Ahmed el Maghrun | El Magrun | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 13,050[8] | 4,500[9] |
Soluch | Suluq | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 20,123[8] | 5,500[9] |
Derna | Derna | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 145[8] | |
Apollonia | Apollonia | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 1,354[8] | |
Barce | Barce | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 538[8] | |
Driana | Driana | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 225[8] | |
Nufilia | Nufilia | Libya | 1930 | 1933 | 375[8] | |
Danane | Mogadishu | Somalia | 1935 | 1941 | 6,000[8] | 3,175[10] |
Total | ~44 675[11] |
World War II
editName of the camp | Location of locality | Present-day country | Date of establishment | Date of disestablishment | Estimated number of prisoners | Estimated number of deaths |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Bakar | Bakar | Croatia | 31 December 1942 | 1 July 1943 | 893[12] | 100–120[13] |
Bolzano | South Tyrol | Italy | September 8, 1943 | April 29 and May 3, 1945 | 11,000 | |
Campagna | Salerno | Italy | 15 June 1940 | 19 September 1943 | ||
Chiesanuova | Padua | Italy | June 1942 | |||
Ferramonti di Tarsia | Cosenza | Italy | summer 1940 | 4 September 1943 | 3,800 | |
Giado | Jadu, Libya | Libya | January 1942 | 24 January 1943 | 3,146[14] | 564 |
Gonars | Palmanova | Italy | March 1942 | 8 September 1943 | 7,000 | 453; >500 |
Mamula | Mamula island | Montenegro | 30 May 1942 | 14 September 1943 | 2,322 | 200[15] |
Monigo | Treviso | Italy | 1 July 1942 | May 1945 | 10,000 | 187–225 |
Molat | Molat | Croatia | 28 June 1942 | 8 September 1943 | 20,000[16] | c. 1,000[16] |
Pisticci | Southeast of Pisticci in Camporotondo[17] | Italy[17] | 1939[17] | September 13, 1943[17] | Capacity of 1,000[17] | Not stated[17] |
Rab, separate camps for Slovenes/Croats and Jews | Rab (Arbe) island | Croatia | July 1942 | 11 September 1943 | 10,000; 15,000 | 2,000; >3,500; 4,000 |
Renicci di Anghiari | Arezzo | Italy | October 1942 | 10,000 | 159 | |
Risiera di San Sabba[18] | Trieste | Italy | October 1943 | April 1945 | > 11,500 | 4,000–5,000[19] |
Visco | Palmanova | Italy | winter 1942 | |||
Zlarin | Zlarin | Croatia | March 1943 | June 1943 | 2,500 | 26 |
Campo di Fossoli | Carpi | Italy | May 1942 | March 1944 |
References
edit- ^ Alessandra Kersevan 2008: (Editor) Foibe – Revisionismo di stato e amnesie della repubblica. Kappa Vu. Udine.
- ^ Survivors of war camp lament Italy's amnesia Archived 2008-10-20 at the Wayback Machine, 2003, International Herald Tribune
- ^ Di Sante, Costantino (2005) Italiani senza onore: I crimini in Jugoslavia e i processi negati (1941–1951), Ombre Corte, Milano. (Archived by WebCite®)
- ^ L'Africa del Duce: i crimini fascisti in Africa
- ^ Ilan Pappé, The Modern Middle East. Routledge, 2005, ISBN 0-415-21409-2, p. 26.
- ^ Del Boca, Angelo (11 January 2011). Italiani, brava gente. Neri Pozza Editore. ISBN 9788854504950.
Gli ultimi lager sarebbero stati smantellati nel settembre 1933. Dei 100.000 libici che erano partiti dal Gebel Achdar e dalla Marmarica, ne sarebbero tornati a casa 60.000.
- ^ Ottolenghi, Gustavo (1997). Gli italiani e il colonialismo: i campi di detenzione italiani in Africa. Sugarco. p. 174. ISBN 9788871983974.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Michael R. Ebner. Geoff Simons. Ordinary Violence in Mussolini's Italy. New York, New York, USA: Cambridge University Press, 2011. P. 261.
- ^ a b c "I campi concentramento per i civili nell'Africa italiana". criminidiguerra.it. Archived from the original on 2020-11-12.
- ^ Donatella Strangio. The Reasons for Underdevelopment: The Case of Decolonisation in Somaliland. Springer, 2012. P. 5.
- ^ Sum among the estimates of the deaths in the Danane camp (source Donatella Strangio), the deaths of all the camps in Italian Libya (source Angelo Del Boca), and the deaths in the Nocra camp (source Gustavo Ottolenghi).
- ^ Bakar concentration camp, Online Research project
- ^ "Talijanski koncentracioni logor Bakar 1941-1943". Retrieved 7 July 2022.
- ^ Maurice M. Roumani: The Jews of Libya. Sussex Academic Press 2007, ISBN 978-1-84519-137-5, p 34.
- ^ Dizdar, Zdravko (2005). "Italian Policies Toward Croatians In Occupied Territories During The Second World War". Hrvatski institut za povijest. p. 196.
- ^ a b Bašić 2008, pp. 196.
- ^ a b c d e f The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933–1945 (PDF). Vol. 3. Indiana University Press. pp. 448–449. doi:10.2307/j.ctt22zmbr7.9. Retrieved 2024-01-23.
- ^ "English - Risiera di San Sabba – Monumento Nazionale – Comune di Trieste". risierasansabba.it. Archived from the original on 2014-02-03.
- ^ "Trieste ebraica » La Risiera di San Sabba". moked.it.
Works cited
edit- Bašić, Josip-Bepo (2008). MOLAT U DRUGOM SVJETSKOM RATU 1941.-1945 - tragovima događaja. Zadar: Hrvatska udruga logoraša antifašista u talijanskom koncentracijskom logoru Molat.
External links
edit- campifascisti.it, Online Research project
- "The Last Witnesses", 2013 Exhibition at National Museum for Contemporary History (Slovenia) documenting photos and interviews with survivors